Fuses and antifuses have been used in the manufacture and repair of integrated circuits for some time. The word fuse will be used throughout this specification to mean fuse, antifuse, or both. The uses of fuses have been in: (1) the repair of circuits through the selective addition and deletion (or substitution) of circuitry to repair bad portions of circuitry; (2) the marking of units for identification; (3) the customization of circuits by altering their structure, paths, or electrical characteristics. It has been common for a fuse to have an open area above the fuse to allow for the application of a radiant energy beam to the fuse from above the integrated circuit. It has also been common for the area around the fuse to be free of active circuitry (transistors, resistors, signal lines, junctions, etc.) for a distance larger than the minimum feature dimensions of the process used. The reason for this practice is that the spot size of the radiant energy beam has been larger than the feature size of the fuse, and the nearby circuitry could not be subjected to the heat of that radiant energy pulse, for fear that it would be damaged. Additionally, the area below the fuse has been kept clear of active circuitry (transistors, resistors, signal lines, junctions, etc.) for fear that the radiant energy used to configure the fuse would damage this active circuitry. Thus, the use of radiant energy configurable fuses for custom integrated circuits will increase the overall chip area of the integrated circuit since active circuitry could not be placed underneath or near these fuses.